The commissaries of police of Paris, as a general thing, are no
simpletons; and, if they are ever taken in, it is because it has
suited them to be taken in.
Their modest title covers the most important, perhaps, of
magistracies, almost the only one known to the lower classes; an
enormous power, and an influence so decisive, that the most sensible
statesman of the reign of Louis Philippe ventured once to say, “Give
me twenty good commissaries of police in Paris, and I’ll undertake
to suppress any government: net profit, one hundred millions.”
Parisian above all, the commissary has had ample time to study his
ground when he was yet only a peace-officer. The dark side of the
most brilliant lives has no mysteries for him. He has received the
strangest confidences: he has listened to the most astounding
confessions. He knows how low humanity can stoop, and what
aberrations there are in brains apparently the soundest. The
work woman whom her husband beats, and the great lady whom her husband
cheats, have both come to him. He has been sent for by the
shop-keeper whom his wife deceives, and by the millionaire who has
been blackmailed. To his office, as to a lay confessional, all
passions fatally lead. In his presence the dirty linen of two
millions of people is washed _en famille_.
A Paris commissary of police, who after ten years’ practice, could
retain an illusion, believe in something, or be astonished at any
thing in the world, would be but a fool. If he is still capable
of some emotion, he is a good man.
The one who had just walked into M. Favoral’s apartment was already
past middle age, colder than ice, and yet kindly, but of that
commonplace kindliness which frightens like the executioner’s
politeness at the scaffold.
He required but a single glance of his small but clear eyes to
decipher the physiognomies of all these worthy people standing
around the disordered table. And beckoning to the agents who
accompanied him to stop at the door,--“Monsieur Vincent Favoral?”
he inquired. The cashier’s guests, M. Desormeaux excepted,
seemed stricken with stupor. Each one felt as if he had a share
of the disgrace of this police invasion. The dupes who are
sometimes caught in clandestine “hells” have the same humiliated
attitudes.
At last, and not without an effort,
“M. Favoral is no longer here,” replied M. Chapelain, the old
lawyer.
The commissary of police started. Whilst they were discussing with
him through the door, he had perfectly well understood that they
were only trying to gain time; and, if he had not at once burst in
the door, it was solely owing to his respect for M. Desormeaux
himself, whom he knew personally, and still more for his title of
head clerk at the Department of Justice. But his suspicions did
not extend beyond the destruction of a few compromising papers.
Whereas, in fact:
“You have helped M. Favoral to escape, gentlemen?” said he.
No one replied.
“Silence means assent,” he added. “Very well: which way did he get
off?”
Still no answer. M. Desclavettes would have been glad to add
something to the forty-five thousand francs he had just lost, to be,
together with Mme. Desclavettes, a hundred miles away.
“Where is Mme. Favoral?” resumed the commissary, evidently well
informed. “Where are Mlle. Gilberte and M. Maxence Favoral?”
They continued silent. No one in the dining-room knew what might
have taken place in the other room; and a single word might be treason.
The commissary then became impatient.
“Take up a light,” said he to one of the agents who had remained at
the door, “and follow me. We shall see.”
And without a shadow of hesitation, for it seems to be the privilege
of police-agents to be at home everywhere, he crossed the parlor,
and reached Mlle. Gilberte’s room just as she was withdrawing from
the window.
“Ah, it is that way he escaped!” he exclaimed.
He rushed to the window, and remained long enough leaning on his
elbows to thoroughly examine the ground, and understand the situation
of the apartment.
“It’s evident,” he said at last, “this window opens on the courtyard
of the next house.”
This was said to one of his agents, who bore an unmistakable
resemblance to the servant who had been asking so many questions in
the afternoon.
“Instead of gathering so much useless information,” he added, “why
did you not post yourself as to the outlets of the house?”
He was “sold”; and yet he manifested neither spite nor anger. He
seemed in no wise anxious to run after the fugitive. Upon the
features of Maxence and of Mlle. Gilberte, and more still in Mme.
Favoral’s eyes, he had read that it would be useless for the present.
“Let us examine the papers, then,” said he.
“My husband’s papers are all in his study,” replied Mme. Favoral.
“Please lead me to it, madame.”
The room which M. Favoral called loftily his study was a small room
with a tile floor, white-washed walls, and meanly lighted through a
narrow transom.
It was furnished with an old desk, a small wardrobe with grated door,
a few shelves upon which were piled some bandboxes and bundles of
old newspapers, and two or three deal chairs.
“Where are the keys?” inquired the commissary of police.
“My father always carries them in his pocket, sir,” replied Maxence.
“Then let some one go for a locksmith.” Stronger than fear,
curiosity had drawn all the guests of the cashier of the Mutual
Credit Society, M. Desormeaux, M. Chapelain, M. Desclavettes himself;
and, standing within the door-frame, they followed eagerly every
motion of the commissary, who, pending the arrival of the locksmith,
was making a flying examination of the bundles of papers left exposed
upon the desk.
After a while, and unable to hold in any longer:
“Would it be indiscreet,” timidly inquired the old bronze-merchant,
“to ask the nature of the charges against that poor Favoral?”
“Embezzlement, sir.”
“And is the amount large?”
“Had it been small, I should have said theft. Embezzling commences
only when the sum has reached a round figure.”
Annoyed at the sardonic tone of the commissary:
“The fact is,” resumed M. Chapelain, “Favoral was our friend; and,
if we could get him out of the scrape, we would all willingly
contribute.”
“It’s a matter of ten or twelve millions, gentlemen.” Was it
possible? Was it even likely? Could any one imagine so many
millions slipping through the fingers of M. de Thaller’s methodic
cashier?
“Ah, sir!” exclaimed Mme. Favoral, “if any thing could relieve my
feelings, the enormity of that sum would. My husband was a man of
simple and modest tastes.”
The commissary shook his head.
“There are certain passions,” he interrupted, “which nothing betrays
externally. Gambling is more terrible than fire. After a fire, some
charred remnants are found. What is there left after a lost game?
Fortunes may be thrown into the vortex of the bourse, without a trace
of them being left.”
The unfortunate woman was not convinced.
“I could swear, sir,” she protested, “that I knew how my husband
spent every hour of his life.”
“Do not swear, madame.”
“All our friends will tell you how parsimonious my husband was.”
“Here, madame, towards yourself and your children, I have no doubt;
for seeing is believing: but elsewhere--”
He was interrupted by the arrival of the locksmith, who, in less
than five minutes, had picked all the locks of the old desk.
But in vain did the commissary search all the drawers. He found
only those useless papers which are made relics of by people who
have made order their religious faith,--uninteresting letters,
grocers’ and butchers’ bills running back twenty years.
“It is a waste of time to look for any thing here,” he growled.
And in fact he was about to give up his perquisitions, when a bundle
thinner than the rest attracted his attention. He cut the thread
that bound it; and almost at once:
“I knew I was right,” he said. And holding out a paper to Mme. Favoral:
“Read, madame, if you please.”
It was a bill. She read thus:
“Sold to M. Favoral an India Cashmere, fr. 8,500.
Received payment, FORBE & TOWLER.”
“Is it for you, madame,” asked the commissary, “that this magnificent
shawl was bought?”
Stupefied with astonishment, the poor woman still refused to admit
the evidence.
“Madame de Thaller spends a great deal,” she stammered. “My husband
often made important purchases for her account.”
“Often, indeed!” interrupted the commissary of police; “for here
are many other receipted bills,--earrings, sixteen thousand francs;
a bracelet, three thousand francs; a parlor set, a horse, two velvet
dresses. Here is a part, at least, if not the whole, of the ten
millions.”
V
Had the commissary received any information in advance? or was he
guided only by the scent peculiar to men of his profession, and the
habit of suspecting every thing, even that which seems most unlikely?
At any rate he expressed himself in a tone of absolute certainty.
The agents who had accompanied and assisted him in his researches
were winking at each other, and giggling stupidly. The situation
struck them as rather pleasant.
The others, M. Desclavettes, M. Chapelain, and the worthy M.
Desormeaux himself, could have racked their brains in vain to find
terms wherein to express the immensity of their astonishments.
Vincent Favoral, their old friend, paying for cashmeres, diamonds,
and parlor sets! Such an idea could not enter in their minds. For
whom could such princely gifts be intended? For a mistress, for
one of those redoubtable creatures whom fancy represents crouching
in the depths of love, like monsters at the bottom of their caves!
But how could any one imagine the methodic cashier of the Mutual
Credit Society carried away by one of those insane passions which
knew no reason? Ruined by gambling, perhaps, but by a woman!
Could any one picture him, so homely and so plain here, Rue St.
Gilles, at the head of another establishment, and leading elsewhere
in one of the brilliant quarters of Paris, a reckless life, such as
strike terror in the bosom of quiet families?
Could any one understand the same man at once miserly-economical and
madly-prodigal, storming when his wife spent a few cents, and robbing
to supply the expenses of an adventuress, and collecting in the same
drawer the jeweler’s accounts and the butcher’s bills?
“It is the climax of absurdity,” murmured good M. Desormeaux.
Maxence fairly shook with wrath. Mlle. Gilberte was weeping.
Mme. Favoral alone, usually so timid, boldly defended, and with her
utmost energy, the man whose name she bore. That he might have
embezzled millions, she admitted: that he had deceived and betrayed
her so shamefully, that he had made a wretched dupe of her for so
many years, seemed to her insensate, monstrous, impossible.
And purple with shame:
“Your suspicions would vanish at once, sir,” she said to the
commissary, “if I could but explain to you our mode of life.”
Encouraged by his first discovery, he was proceeding more minutely
with his perquisitions, undoing the strings of every bundle.
“It is useless, madame,” he answered in that brief tone which made so
much impression upon M. Desclavettes. “You can only tell me what you
know; and you know nothing.”
“Never, sir, did a man lead a more regular life than M. Favoral.”
“In appearance, you are right. Besides, to regulate one’s disorder
is one of the peculiarities of our time. We open credits to our
passions, and we keep account of our infamies by double entry. We
operate with method. We embezzle millions that we may hang diamonds
to the ears of an adventuress; but we are careful, and we keep the
receipted bills.”
“But, sir, I have already told you that I never lost sight of my
husband.”
“Of course.”
“Every morning, precisely at nine o’clock, he left home to go to M.
de Thaller’s office.”
“The whole neighborhood knows that, madame.”
“At half-past five he came home.”
“That, also, is a well-known fact.”
“After dinner he went out to play a game, but it was his only
amusement; and at eleven o’clock he was always in bed.”
“Perfectly correct.”
“Well, then, sir, where could M. Favoral have found time to abandon
himself to the excesses of which you accuse him?”
Imperceptibly the commissary of police shrugged his shoulders.
“Far from me, madame,” he uttered, “to doubt your good faith. What
matters it, moreover, whether your husband spent in this way or in
that way the sums which he is charged with having appropriated? But
what do your objections prove? Simply that M. Favoral was very
skillful, and very much self-possessed. Had he breakfasted when he
left you at nine? No. Pray, then, where did he breakfast? In a
restaurant? Which? Why did he come home only at half-past five,
when his office actually closed at three o’clock? Are you quite
sure that it was to the Cafe Turc that he went every evening?
Finally, why do not you say anything of the extra work which he
always had to attend to, as he pretended, once or twice a month?
Sometimes it was a loan, sometimes a liquidation, or a settlement
of dividends, which devolved upon him. Did he come home then? No.
He told you that he would dine out, and that it would be more
convenient for him to have a cot put up in his office; and thus
you were twenty-four or forty-eight hours without seeing him.
Surely this double existence must have weighed heavily upon him;
but he was forbidden from breaking off with you, under penalty of
being caught the very next day with his hand in the till. It is
the respectability of his official life here which made the other
possible,--that which has absorbed such enormous sums. The harsher
and the closer he were here, the more magnificent he could show
himself elsewhere. His household in the Rue St. Gilles was for
him a certificate of impunity. Seeing him so economical, every one
thought him rich. People who seem to spend nothing are always
trusted. Every privation which he imposed upon you increased his
reputation of austere probity, and raised him farther above
suspicion.”
Big tears were rolling down Mme. Favoral’s cheeks.
“Why not tell me the whole truth?” she stammered.
“Because I do not know it,” replied the commissary; “because these
are all mere presumptions. I have seen so many instances of similar
calculations!”
Then regretting, perhaps, to have said so much,
“But I may be mistaken,” he added: “I do not pretend to be
infallible.” He was just then completing a brief inventory of all
the papers found in the old desk. There was nothing left but to
examine the drawer which was used for a cash drawer. He found in
it in gold, notes, and small change, seven hundred and eighteen
francs.
Having counted this sum, the commissary offered it to Mme. Favoral,
saying,
“This belongs to you madame.”
But instinctively she withdrew her hand.
“Never!” she said.
The commissary went on with a gesture of kindness,--“I understand
your scruples, madame, and yet I must insist. You may believe me
when I tell you that this little sum is fairly and legitimately
yours. You have no personal fortune.”
The efforts of the poor woman to keep from bursting into loud sobs
were but too visible.
“I possess nothing in the world, sir,” she said in a broken voice.
“My husband alone attended to our business-affairs. He never spoke
to me about them; and I would not have dared to question him. Alone
he disposed of our money. Every Sunday he handed me the amount which
he thought necessary for the expenses of the week, and I rendered him
an account of it. When my children or myself were in need of any
thing, I told him so, and he gave me what he thought proper. This
is Saturday: of what I received last Sunday I have five francs left:
that, is our whole fortune.”
Positively the commissary was moved.
“You see, then, madame,” he said, “that you cannot hesitate: you must
live.”
Maxence stepped forward.
“Am I not here, sir?” he said.
The commissary looked at him keenly, and in a grave tone,
“I believe indeed, sir,” he replied, “that you will not suffer your
mother and sister to want for any thing. But resources are not
created in a day. Yours, if I have not been deceived, are more than
limited just now.”
And as the young man blushed, and did not answer, he handed the seven
hundred francs to Mlle. Gilberte, saying,
“Take this, mademoiselle: your mother permits it.” His work was done.
To place his seals upon M. Favoral’s study was the work of a moment.
Beckoning, then, to his agents to withdraw, and being ready to leave
himself,
“Let not the seals cause you any uneasiness, madame,” said the
commissary of police to Mme. Favoral. “Before forty-eight hours,
some one will come to remove these papers, and restore to you the
free use of that room.”
He went out; and, as soon as the door had closed behind him,
“Well?” exclaimed M. Desormeaux;
But no one had any thing to say. The guests of that house where
misfortune had just entered were making haste to leave. The
catastrophe was certainly terrible and unforeseen; but did it not
reach them too? Did they not lose among them more than three hundred
thousand francs?
Thus, after a few commonplace protestations, and some of those
promises which mean nothing, they withdrew; and, as they were going
down the stairs,
“The commissary took Vincent’s escape too easy,” remarked M.
Desormeaux. “He must know some way to catch him again.”